For the second time in less than three weeks, Erica Muskgrow’s belongings have been confiscated by city workers. After her bags of clothes and hygiene items were taken at Stranahan Park on June 23, the chronically homeless woman moved to Fort Lauderdale Beach. Last Tuesday, her clothes, blanket, bus pass,…
Lagoge Graham had the bad luck of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The 26-year-old Boca Raton resident was sitting in his car outside an apartment complex in Deerfield Beach just after a woman called to say that she’d heard five gunshots outside. Four minutes later, a…
It’s May 13, just after 6:30 p.m., and a grimy Fort Lauderdale Denny’s reeks of cooking grease and industrial disinfectant when Tim Canova busts through the door. He’s trailed by a small team of handlers. An audience of about 20 ACLU members awaits him at a banquet table and surrounding…
One day in June, Shantell McNair headed to the Broward Juvenile Detention Center in Fort Lauderdale to visit her 13-year-old son. Then she was turned away without explanation. For weeks, McNair, who is age 28 and lives in Pompano Beach, tried calling the center to ask why she hadn’t been…
At 5:45 p.m. Sunday evening, Jesse Cosme stood outside Bass Supermarket in Sistrunk with the Pokemon Go app open on his iPhone. Cosme and three activists with the Black Lives Matter Alliance of Broward had spent a half hour trying to catch the invisible Japanese monsters in Fort Lauderdale’s historic…
Pat Riley may have to start rethinking his free agency strategy; maybe he should scout hospitals for the tallest newborns, and recruit their parents. Since LeBron James abruptly left the Miami Heat two summers ago to join the Cleveland Cavaliers a new trend has been birthed among his NBA counterparts; star…
After the sun set on July 10, Robin Merrill headed over to the A1A median between Oakland Park Boulevard and NE 21st Street. The stump of a black olive tree lay at her feet. The artist and owner of Upper Room Art Gallery bowed her head. “Thank you,” she said…
Mike Kurdek watched a piece of the Pompano Pier fall into the sea in 2012. As the outer bands of Hurricane Sandy whipped wind and waves toward Pompano Beach, Kurdek and seven buddies stood at the pier’s end fishing for sharks. The boards under their feet started to come loose,…
Workers protested at the McDonald’s at 3306 S. University Drive in Miramar for almost half an hour this morning, demanding better working conditions and a $15 minimum wage. “I have seven children to take care of, and I can’t do that on $8.05 an hour,” Marianne Raney, who has been…
It didn’t take long for Pokémon Go to become a hazard to public health. Just yesterday, a car crash took place in Texas after a driver parked in middle of the road and jumped out of the car to catch a Pokémon. No wonder, then, that local police have asked…
Given the two recent high-profile incidents of black men dying at the hands of the police, you wouldn’t think black-on-black crime would be the top concern on people’s minds. But that’s the subject of a forum this weekend hosted by motivational speaker Kevin Dorival and headlined by Broward Sheriff Scott…
There’s no escaping the cult phenomenon of Pokemon Go in South Florida. Millennials teem the tri-county area on their phones, hunting for invisible creatures in what the app calls an “augmented reality.” Generally, the battling and violence stays in the virtual realm, but the Morikami Museum is reporting that Pokemon…
Last week, the Palm Beach elections supervisor raised eyebrows when she decided to move a polling station from a mosque to a library, apparently caving to complaints from Islamophobic residents. But it seems like there’s also a prejudice at work against synagogues at the Palm Beach county elections office. In…
Geeking out over Pokémon is finally cool with the recent arrival of Pokemon Go It’s no longer a passive, 1990s card game played in middle school cafeterias. In order to catch ’em all, you need to ditch your air conditioning and Netflix and take to the actual streets. But the…
One day early last year, Luiz Rodrigues gazed out at the dunes near the Fourth Street Beach. The sandy hills are cordoned off with rope and wooden fencing, a sanctuary for many amid the bustle of South Beach. Inside, sea oats swayed in the wind. Fuchsia bayhop flowers blossomed. But…
A pro-business Republican, one not beholden to the religious faction of the party, gets elected governor. Before he even warms the desk chair in the governor’s office, he meets with Las Vegas figures interested in expanding gambling in the Sunshine State. What are the odds of success? As it turns…
Four months after North Carolina lawmakers required transgender people to use the bathroom of the gender listed on their birth certificates, the City of West Palm Beach has announced that it will now make life a little easier for its transgender employees and their families. Now the city’s health insurance…
When Broward Sherriff’s Office Sergean. Ian Doriot woke up Sunday morning, he peered out his window to check on his squad car, parked on the swale outside his house – just in case. It’s part of his morning routine. “I don’t expect anything bad to happen,” Doriot says. “It’s just…
Jay Scott, sporting a brown ponytail and a shirt that exposes his tattoos, walks through Habatat Galleries in West Palm Beach, past Dale Chihuly’s fluorescent, coral-like cylinders and William Morris’ display of ancient tools. The 39-year-old weaves among pieces created by some of the world’s most renowned glass artists and…
Earlier this year, Florida passed a law allowing naloxone to be sold over the counter at drugstores. At the time, it was heralded as an important step towards fighting the growing number of opioid deaths in the state. Naloxone, better known by its most common brand name, Narcan, can temporarily…
Johnny MacDougall, a blond-haired, blue-eyed little leaguer from Weston, loved baseball. He shared that passion with his dad, Dave, who took him to more than 100 Marlin games.. After watching a one at Camden Yards in Baltimore when Johnny was 5 years old, the pair made a pact to visit…
To put it mildly, it’s been a bad week. On Tuesday night, Alton Sterling, a 37-year-old father of five, was fatally shot by police officers in a Baton Rouge parking lot where he’d been selling CDs. Then, on Wednesday night, Philando Castile, 32, was shot by a police officer in…
